Memory or Memorex
by Neon Daisies
Summary: What happens when Mort finds something that belongs to Amy in his Jeep? A short vignette taking place before the events of Secret Window.


**Author's Note: **well, this is just a little something I came up with last night as I was trying to get to sleep. I don't know why – it wasn't the Secret Window story I was trying to write. But I had the image of Mort vacuuming out his Jeep at one of those self-serve car washes and finding a cassette tape under one of the seats. And then I thought about what tape cellophane looked like when it was out of the tape. Reddish brown, shiny, coiled like guts…strange thoughts before bed, I know. ;) Anyway, that's where this came from.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own it. "Secret Window, Secret Garden" found in Four Past Midnight By Stephen King Published by Viking Adult; Open Market Ed edition (© September 1, 1990)

He found the cassette tape under the passenger seat.

Mort turned the cassette over in his hands, studying the ivory plastic with the intensity of man discovering fire. So simple really, so nondescript. People in every household in America owned them. This was one among many that were normally stowed in his glove compartment.

Or rather, _had_ been stowed in his glove compartment.

The tape belonged to Amy.

It was amazing how something so common place could bring the pain of his divorce roaring back as he'd just discovered Ted and Amy together. Still, the pain wasn't enough to stave away the temptation to put the tape in the Jeep's tape deck.

The drone of the vacuum at the self-service car wash faded into the background. Mort stared at the tape deck as if nothing else existed. He knew what would happen if he put the tape in. Once he turned the key in the ignition, the tape would start playing. And when the tape started playing, the memories would start flowing; memories of Amy, and him and Amy…and then Ted and Amy.

Damnit. Mort's hands trembled as the familiar rage from the last months swept through him. _Ted_ and Amy. It always came down to _Ted_ and Amy. It was the reason there was no more _Mort_ and Amy.

Plastic. Just plastic. It'd be so easy to break. And it'd be worth it. More than worth it. _Anything _would be worth bleeding off a little of the pain and frustration that filled him.

But it was _Amy's_.

The vacuum in his hand fell silent as his fifty-cent's worth ran out. Absently, Mort set the hose down and climbed into his Jeep. Seated behind the steering wheel, Mort placed the tape on the dashboard where he couldn't accidentally break it. Wasn't it enough that he didn't have Amy any more? Did he have to destroy everything of hers that remained in his life?

_It's just music,_ he told himself. Just music. Innocuous notes strung together in a pleasing arrangement. It had nothing to do with Amy herself, it was just something that she'd enjoyed. Alright, so he wouldn't be able to enjoy it himself, but that didn't mean he had to break it. He could give it away, or mail it back to her.

_Mail it back so that she and **Ted** can listen to it?_

The poison welled up again, choking off his air, blanketing his vision. Things he didn't want to remember, much less ever see again, played in front of his eyes like a reel from a film. He felt the stone mask his face had become when his neighbor had come by to ask about the car that had been parked in his driveway overnight every time he was out at a book signing. The dread when he'd picked up a letter that'd fallen out of Amy's briefcase as she rushed from the house one morning. The strange key on her key chain the day he'd had to borrow her car because his was unexpectedly in the shop.

The horror of seeing her car parked outside that run down wayside motel…

Mort didn't remember putting the car in drive. He didn't remember how he'd gotten home. He didn't remember how the tape's case had gotten broken or why its innards lay piled on the seat next to him. A breeze came in the open window, making the cellophane tremor and glisten as if wet with blood.

Mort shied away from the thought, scared that it left him feel free, almost giddy.

God, had he done that?

When could have done it?

When?

And why?

Mort left the pile sitting on the seat as he went inside. He was very tired. Maybe everything would make sense after he slept…


End file.
